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Donovan, formerly CEO of Alpheon — an MSP that Best Buy-mindSHIFT acquired — has been with Nimsoft since February. “It’s a great journey and nowhere near done,” said Donovan, who’s at this week’s CompTIA Breakaway in Las Vegas. “It’s about getting out and being an evangelist and making MSPs more efficient.”

A prime example: Donovan mentioned several MSPs that have seen their monthly recurring revenues jump 250 percent in the past year or two. Some are MSPmentor 100 companies — some will likely land on the list next year.

Many of those MSPs are leveraging a repeatable service and solutions catalog from Nimsoft. “It’s the cook book but not the run book. It’s a glossary but not a price list,” said Donovan, while painting in broad strokes.

Donovan said MSP pricing strategies remains the top question he receives from aspiring managed services providers. “We’re working with partners to help them determine the costs associated with profitable solutions,” said Donovan. Yes, it’s a bit of a vague statement. But in private, MSPs should ask Donovan for more information. Wink, wink, nudge, nudge.

Donovan’s next step: A mid-market MSP meeting in Chicago. More on that later…

CA Technologies, meanwhile, recently announced somewhat disappointing earnings and discussed slower-than-anticipated revenue growth. Most of the chatter involved mainframe-oriented software sales. But MSPs interest in CA should focus on three core business lines: Nimsoft, ARCserve and AppLogic — a platform that allows service providers to more rapidly enter the cloud and SaaS markets.